The Three Musketeers

Trémouille.

He repaired, therefore, immediately to his hotel, and caused himself to be
announced.

The two nobles saluted each other politely, for if no friendship existed
between them, there was at least esteem. Both were men of courage and honor;
and as M. de la Trémouille-a Protestant, and seeing the king seldom—was of no
party, he did not in general, carry any bias into his social relations. This time,
however, his address, although polite, was cooler than usual.

“Monsieur,” said M. de Tréville, “we fancy that we have each cause to
complain of the other, and I am come to endeavor to clear up this affair.”

“I have no objection,” replied M. de la Trémouille, “but I warn you that I am
well informed, and all the fault is with your Musketeers.”

“You are too just and reasonable a man, monsieur!” said Tréville, “not to
accept the proposal I am about to make to you.”

“Make it, monsieur, I listen.”

“How is Monsieur Bernajoux, your esquire’s relative?”

“Why, monsieur, very ill indeed! In addition to the sword thrust in his arm,
which is not dangerous, he has received another right through his lungs, of
which the doctor says bad things.”

“But has the wounded man retained his senses?”

“Perfectly.”

“Does he talk?”

“With difficulty, but he can speak.”

“Well, monsieur, let us go to him. Let us adjure him, in the name of the God
before whom he must perhaps appear, to speak the truth. I will take him for
judge in his own cause, monsieur, and will believe what he will say.” M. de la
Trémouille reflected for an instant; then as it was difficult to suggest a more
reasonable proposal, he agreed to it.

Both descended to the chamber in which the wounded man lay. The latter, on
seeing these two noble lords who came to visit him, endeavored to raise himself
up in his bed; but he was too weak, and exhausted by the effort, he fell back
again almost senseless.

M. de la Trémouille approached him, and made him inhale some salts, which
recalled him to life. Then M. de Tréville, unwilling that it should be thought that
he had influenced the wounded man, requested M. de la Trémouille to
interrogate him himself.

That happened which M. de Tréville had foreseen. Placed between life and
death, as Bernajoux was, he had no idea for a moment of concealing the truth;
and he described to the two nobles the affair exactly as it had passed.

This was all that M. de Tréville wanted. He wished Bernajoux a speedy
convalescence, took leave of M. de la Trémouille, returned to his hotel, and
immediately sent word to the four friends that he awaited their company at
dinner.

M. de Tréville entertained good company, wholly anticardinalist, though. It
may easily be understood, therefore, that the conversation during the whole of
dinner turned upon the two checks that his Eminence’s Guardsmen had received.
Now, as D’Artagnan had been the hero of these two fights, it was upon him that
all the felicitations fell, which Athos, Porthos, and Aramis abandoned to him, not
only as good comrades, but as men who had so often had their turn that they
could very well afford him his.

Toward six o’clock M. de Tréville announced that it was time to go to the
Louvre; but as the hour of audience granted by his Majesty was past, instead of
claiming the entrée by the back stairs, he placed himself with the four young
men in the antechamber. The king had not yet returned from hunting. Our young
men had been waiting about half an hour, amid a crowd of courtiers, when all
the doors were thrown open, and his Majesty was announced.

At this announcement D’Artagnan felt himself tremble to the very marrow of
his bones. The coming instant would in all probability decide the rest of his life.
His eyes therefore were fixed in a sort of agony upon the door through which the
king must enter.

Louis XIII appeared, walking fast. He was in hunting costume covered with
dust, wearing large boots, and holding a whip in his hand. At the first glance
D’Artagnan judged that the mind of the king was stormy.

This disposition, visible as it was in his Majesty, did not prevent the courtiers
from ranging themselves along his pathway. In royal antechambers it is worth
more to be viewed with an angry eye than not to be seen at all. The three
Musketeers therefore did not hesitate to make a step forward. D’Artagnan on the
contrary remained concealed behind them; but although the king knew Athos,
Porthos, and Aramis personally, he passed before them without speaking or
looking—indeed, as if he had never seen them before. As for M. de Tréville,
when the eyes of the king fell upon him, he sustained the look with so much
firmness that it was the king who dropped his eyes; after which his Majesty,
grumbling, entered his apartment.

“Matters go but badly,” said Athos, smiling; “and we shall not be made
Chevaliers of the Orderi this time.”

“Wait here ten minutes,” said M. de Tréville; “and if at the expiration of ten
minutes you do not see me come out, return to my hotel, for it will be useless for
you to wait for me longer.”

The four young men waited ten minutes, a quarter of an hour, twenty minutes;
and seeing that M. de Tréville did not return, went away very uneasy as to what
was going to happen.

M. de Tréville entered the king’s cabinet boldly, and found his Majesty in a
very ill humor, seated on an armchair, beating his boot with the handle of his
whip. This, however, did not prevent his asking, with the greatest coolness, after
his Majesty’s health.

“Bad, monsieur, bad!” replied the king; “I am bored.”

This was, in fact, the worst complaint of Louis XIII, who would sometimes
take one of his courtiers to a window and say, “Monsieur So-and-so, let us weary
ourselves together.”

“How! your Majesty is bored? Have you not enjoyed the pleasures of the
chase today?”

“A fine pleasure, indeed, monsieur! Upon my soul, everything degenerates;
and I don’t know whether it is the game which leaves no scent, or the dogs that
have no noses. We started a stag of ten branches. We chased him for six hours,
and when he was near being taken—when St.-Simon14 was already putting his
horn to his mouth to sound the halali—crack, all the pack takes the wrong scent
and sets off after a two-year-older. I shall be obliged to give up hunting, as I
have given up hawking. Ah, I am an unfortunate king, Monsieur de Tréville! I
had but one gerfalcon, and he died day before yesterday.“

“Indeed, sire, I wholly comprehend your disappointment. The misfortune is
great; but I think you have still a good number of falcons, sparrow hawks, and
tiercets.”

“And not a man to instruct them. Falconers are declining. I know no one but
myself who is acquainted with the noble art of venery. After me it will be all
over, and people will hunt with gins, snares, and traps. If I had but the time to
train pupils! But there is the cardinal always at hand, who does not leave me a
moment’s repose; who talks to me about Spain, who talks to me about Austria,
who talks to me about England! Ah! à propos of the cardinal, Monsieur de
Tréville, I am vexed with you.”

This was the chance at which M. de Tréville waited for the king. He knew the

king of old, and he knew that all these complaints were but a preface—a sort of
excitation to encourage himself—and that he had now come to his point at last.

“And in what have I been so unfortunate as to displease your Majesty?” asked
M. de Tréville, feigning the most profound astonishment.

“Is it thus you perform your charge, monsieur?” continued the king, without
directly replying to De Tréville’s question. “Is it for this I name you captain of
my Musketeers, that they should assassinate a man, disturb a whole quarter, and
endeavor to set fire to Paris, without your saying a word? But yet,” continued the
king, “undoubtedly my haste accuses you wrongfully; without doubt the rioters
are in prison, and you come to tell me justice is done.”

“Sire,” replied M. de Tréville, calmly, “on the contrary, I come to demand it
of you.”

“And against whom?” cried the king.

“Against calumniators,” said M. de Tréville.

“Ah! this is something new,” replied the king. “Will you tell me that your
three damned Musketeers, Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, and your youngster from
Béarn, have not fallen, like so many furies, upon poor Bernajoux, and have not
maltreated him in such a fashion that probably by this time he is dead? Will you
tell me that they did not lay siege to the hotel of the Duc de la Trémouille, and
that they did not endeavor to burn it?—which would not, perhaps, have been a
great misfortune in time of war, seeing that it is nothing but a nest of Huguenots,
but which is, in time of peace, a frightful example. Tell me, now, can you deny
all this?”

“And who has told you this fine story, sire?” asked Tréville, quietly.

“Who has told me this fine story, monsieur? Who should it be but he who
watches while I sleep, who labors while I amuse myself, who conducts
everything at home and abroad—in France as in Europe?”

“Your Majesty probably refers to God,” said M. de Tréville; “for I know no
one except God who can be so far above your Majesty.”

“No, monsieur; I speak of the prop of the state, of my only servant, of my only
friend—of the cardinal.”

“His Eminence is not his Holiness, sire.”

“What do you mean by that, monsieur?”

“That it is only the Pope who is infallible,15 and that this infallibility does not
extend to cardinals.”

“You mean to say that he deceives me; you mean to say that he betrays me?

You accuse him, then? Come, speak; avow freely that you accuse him!”
“No, sire; but I say that he deceives himself. I say that he is ill-informed. I say

that he has hastily accused your Majesty’s Musketeers, toward whom he is
unjust, and that he has not obtained his information from good sources.”

“The accusation comes from Monsieur de la Trémouille, from the duke
himself. What do you say to that?”

“I might answer, sire, that he is too deeply interested in the question to be a
very impartial witness; but so far from that, sire, I know the duke to be a royal
gentleman, and I refer the matter to him-but upon one condition, sire.”

“What?”
“It is that your Majesty will make him come here, will interrogate him
yourself, tête-à-tête, without witnesses, and that I shall see your Majesty as soon
as you have seen the duke.”
“What, then! you will bind yourself,” cried the king, “by what Monsieur de la
Trémouille shall say?”
“Yes, sire.”
“You will accept his judgment?”
“Undoubtedly.”
“And you will submit to the reparation he may require?”
“Certainly.”
“La Chesnaye!” cried the king. “La Chesnaye!”
Louis XIII’s confidential valet, who never left the door, entered in reply to the
call.
“La Chesnaye,” said the king, “let someone go instantly and find Monsieur de
la Trémouille; I wish to speak with him this evening.”
“Your Majesty gives me your word that you will not see anyone between
Monsieur de la Trémouille and myself?”
“Nobody, by the faith of a gentleman.”
“Tomorrow, then, sire?”
“Tomorrow, monsieur.”
“At what o’clock, please your Majesty?”
“At any hour you will.”
“But in coming too early I should be afraid of awakening your Majesty.”
“Awaken me! Do you think I ever sleep, then? I sleep no longer, monsieur. I
sometimes dream, that’s all. Come, then, as early as you like—at seven o’clock;

but beware, if you and your Musketeers are guilty.”

“If my Musketeers are guilty, sire, the guilty shall be placed in your Majesty’s
hands, who will dispose of them at your good pleasure. Does your Majesty
require anything further? Speak, I am ready to obey.”

“No, monsieur, no; I am not called Louis the Just without reason. Tomorrow,
then, monsieur—tomorrow.”

“Till then, God preserve your Majesty!”

However ill the king might sleep, M. de Tréville slept still worse. He had
ordered his three Musketeers and their companion to be with him at half past six
in the morning. He took them with him, without encouraging them or promising
them anything, and without concealing from them that their luck, and even his
own, depended upon this cast of the dice.

Arrived at the foot of the back stairs, he desired them to wait. If the king was
still irritated against them, they would depart without being seen; if the king
consented to see them, they would only have to be called.

On arriving at the king’s private antechamber, M. de Tréville found La
Chesnaye, who informed him that they had not been able to find M. de la
Trémouille on the preceding evening at his hotel, that he returned too late to
present himself at the Louvre, that he had only that moment arrived, and that he
was at that very hour with the king.

This circumstance pleased M. de Tréville much, as he thus became certain that
no foreign suggestion could insinuate itself between M. de la Trémouille’s
testimony and himself.

In fact, ten minutes had scarcely passed away when the door of the king’s
closet opened, and M. de Tréville saw M. de la Trémouille come out. The duke
came straight up to him, and said: “Monsieur de Tréville, his Majesty has just
sent for me in order to inquire respecting the circumstances which took place
yesterday at my hotel. I have told him the truth; that is to say, that the fault lay
with my people, and that I was ready to offer you my excuses. Since I have the
good fortune to meet you, I beg you to receive them, and to hold me always as
one of your friends.”

“Monsieur the Duke,” said M. de Tréville, “I was so confident of your loyalty
that I required no other defender before his Majesty than yourself. I find that I
have not been mistaken, and I thank you that there is still one man in France of
whom may be said, without disappointment, what I have said of you.”

“That’s well said,” cried the king, who had heard all these compliments
through the open door; “only tell him, Tréville, since he wishes to be considered

your friend, that I also wish to be one of his, but he neglects me; that it is nearly
three years since I have seen him, and that I never do see him unless I send for
him. Tell him all this for me, for these are things which a king cannot say for
himself.”

“Thanks, sire, thanks,” said the duke; “but your Majesty may be assured that it
is not those—I do not speak of Monsieur de Tréville—whom your Majesty sees
at all hours of the day that are the most devoted to you.

“Ah! you have heard what I said? So much the better, Duke, so much the
better,” said the king, advancing toward the door. “Ah! it is you, Tréville. Where
are your Musketeers? I told you the day before yesterday to bring them with you;
why have you not done so?”

“They are below, sire, and with your permission La Chesnaye will bid them
come up.”

“Yes, yes, let them come up immediately. It is nearly eight o’clock, and at
nine I expect a visit. Go, Monsieur Duke, and return often. Come in, Tréville.”

The Duke saluted and retired. At the moment he opened the door, the three
Musketeers and D’Artagnan, conducted by La Chesnaye, appeared at the top of
the staircase.

“Come in, my braves,” said the king, “come in; I am going to scold you.”

The Musketeers advanced, bowing, D’Artagnan following closely behind
them.

“What the devil!” continued the king. “Seven of his Eminence’s Guards
placed hors de combatj by you four in two days! That’s too many, gentlemen,
too many! If you go on so, his Eminence will be forced to renew his company in
three weeks, and I to put the edicts in force in all their rigor. One now and then I
don’t say much about; but seven in two days, I repeat, it is too many, it is far too
many!”

“Therefore, sire, your Majesty sees that they are come, quite contrite and
repentant, to offer you their excuses.”

“Quite contrite and repentant! Hem!” said the king. “I place no confidence in
their hypocritical faces. In particular, there is one yonder of a Gascon look.
Come hither, monsieur.”

D’Artagnan, who understood that it was to him this compliment was
addressed, approached, assuming a most deprecating air.

“Why, you told me he was a young man? This is a boy, Tréville, a mere boy!
Do you mean to say that it was he who bestowed that severe thrust at jussac?”

“And those two equally fine thrusts at Bernajoux.”

“Truly! ”

“Without reckoning,” said Athos, “that if he had not rescued me from the
hands of Cahusac, I should not now have the honor of making my very humble
reverence to your Majesty.”

“Why, he is a very devil, this Béarnais! Ventre-saint-gris,k Monsieur de
Tréville, as the king my father would have said. But at this sort of work, many
doublets must be slashed and many swords broken. Now, Gascons are always
poor, are they not?”

“Sire, I can assert that they have hitherto discovered no gold mines in their
mountains; though the Lord owes them this miracle in recompense for the
manner in which they supported the pretensions of the king your father.”

“Which is to say that the Gascons made a king of me, myself, seeing that I am
my father’s son, is it not, Tréville? Well, happily, I don’t say nay to it. La
Chesnaye, go and see if by rummaging all my pockets you can find forty
pistoles; and if you can find them, bring them to me. And now let us see, young
man, with your hand upon your conscience, how did all this come to pass?”

D’Artagnan related the adventure of the preceding day in all its details: how,
not having been able to sleep for the joy he felt in the expectation of seeing his
Majesty, he had gone to his three friends three hours before the hour of
audience; how they had gone together to the tennis court, and how, upon the fear
he had manifested lest he receive a ball in the face, he had been jeered at by
Bernajoux, who had nearly paid for his jeer with his life, and M. de la
Trémouille, who had nothing to do with the matter, with the loss of his hotel.

“This is all very well,” murmured the king; “yes, this is just the account the
duke gave me of the affair. Poor cardinal! Seven men in two days, and those of
his very best! But that’s quite enough, gentlemen; please to understand, that’s
enough. You have taken your revenge for the Rue Férou, and even exceeded it;
you ought to be satisfied.”

“If your Majesty is so,” said Tréville, “we are.”

“Oh, yes; I am,” added the king, taking a handful of gold from La Chesnaye,
and putting it into the hand of D’Artagnan. “Here,” said he, “is a proof of my
satisfaction.”

At this epoch, the ideas of pride which are in fashion in our days did not
prevail. A gentleman received, from hand to hand, money from the king, and
was not the least in the world humiliated. D’Artagnan put his forty pistolesl into
his pocket without any scruple—on the contrary, thanking his Majesty greatly.

“There,” said the king, looking at a clock, “there, now, as it is half past eight,
you may retire; for, as I told you, I expect someone at nine. Thanks for your
devotedness, gentlemen. I may continue to rely upon it, may I not?”

“Oh, sire!” cried the four companions, with one voice, “we would allow
ourselves to be cut to pieces in your Majesty’s service.”

“Well, well, but keep whole; that will be better, and you will be more useful to
me. Tréville,” added the king, in a low voice, as the others were retiring, “as you
have no room in the Musketeers, and as we have besides decided that a novitiate
is necessary before entering that corps, place this young man in the company of
the Guards of Monsieur Dessessart, your brother-in-law. Ah, pardieu,m Tréville!
I enjoy beforehand the face the cardinal will make. He will be furious; but I
don’t care. I am doing what is right.”

The king waved his hand to Tréville, who left him and rejoined the
Musketeers, whom he found sharing the forty pistoles with D’Artagnan.

The cardinal, as his Majesty had said, was really furious, so furious that
during eight days he absented himself from the king’s gaming table. This did not
prevent the king from being as complacent to him as possible whenever he met
him, or from asking in the kindest tone, “Well, Monsieur Cardinal, how fares it
with that poor Jussac and that poor Bernajoux of yours?”

7

THE INTERIOR OF “THE MUSKETEERS”

When D’Artagnan was out of the Louvre, and consulted his friends upon the use
he had best make of his share of the forty pistoles, Athos advised him to order a
good repast at the Pomme-de-Pin, Porthos to engage a lackey, and Aramis to
provide himself with a suitable mistress.

The repast was carried into effect that very day, and the lackey waited at table.
The repast had been ordered by Athos, and the lackey furnished by Porthos. He
was a Picard, whom the glorious Musketeer had picked up on the Bridge
Tournelle, making rings and plashing in the water.

Porthos pretended that this occupation was a proof of a reflective and
contemplative organization, and he had brought him away without any other
recommendation. The noble carriage of this gentleman, for whom he believed
himself to be engaged, had won Planchet—that was the name of the Picard. He
felt a slight disappointment, however, when he saw that this place was already
taken by a compeer named Mousqueton, and when Porthos signified to him that
the state of his household, though great, would not support two servants, and that
he must enter into the service of D‘Artagnan. Nevertheless, when he waited at
the dinner given by his master, and saw him take out a handful of gold to pay for
it, he believed his fortune made, and returned thanks to heaven for having
thrown him into the service of such a Crœsus. He preserved this opinion even
after the feast, with the remnants of which he repaired his own long abstinence;
but when in the evening he made his master’s bed, the chimeras of Planchet
faded away. The bed was the only one in the apartment, which consisted of an
antechamber and a bedroom. Planchet slept in the antechamber upon a coverlet
taken from the bed of D’Artagnan, and which D’Artagnan from that time made
shift to do without.

Athos, on his part, had a valet whom he had trained in his service in a
thoroughly peculiar fashion, and who was named Grimaud. He was very
taciturn, this worthy signor. Be it understood we are speaking of Athos. During
the five or six years that he had lived in the strictest intimacy with his
companions, Porthos and Aramis, they could remember having often seen him

smile, but had never heard him laugh. His words were brief and expressive,
conveying all that was meant, and no more; no embellishments, no embroidery,
no arabesques. His conversation was a matter of fact, without a single romance.

Although Athos was scarcely thirty years old, and was of great personal
beauty and intelligence of mind, no one knew whether he had ever had a
mistress. He never spoke of women. He certainly did not prevent others from
speaking of them before him, although it was easy to perceive that this kind of
conversation, in which he only mingled by bitter words and misanthropic
remarks, was very disagreeable to him. His reserve, his roughness, and his
silence made almost an old man of him. He had, then, in order not to disturb his
habits, accustomed Grimaud to obey him upon a simple gesture or upon a simple
movement of his lips. He never spoke to him, except under the most
extraordinary occasions.

Sometimes Grimaud, who feared his master as he did fire, while entertaining a
strong attachment to his person and a great veneration for his talents, believed he
perfectly understood what he wanted, flew to execute the order received, and did
precisely the contrary. Athos then shrugged his shoulders, and, without putting
himself in a passion, thrashed Grimaud. On these days he spoke a little.

Porthos, as we have seen, had a character exactly opposite to that of Athos. He
not only talked much, but he talked loudly, little caring, we must render him that
justice, whether anybody listened to him or not. He talked for the pleasure of
talking and for the pleasure of hearing himself talk. He spoke upon all subjects
except the sciences, alleging in this respect the inveterate hatred he had borne to
scholars from his childhood. He had not so noble an air as Athos, and the
consciousness of his inferiority in this respect had at the commencement of their
intimacy often rendered him unjust toward that gentleman, whom he endeavored
to eclipse by his splendid dress. But with his simple Musketeer’s uniform and
nothing but the manner in which he threw back his head and advanced his foot,
Athos instantly took the place which was his due and consigned the ostentatious
Porthos to the second rank. Porthos consoled himself by filling the antechamber
of M. de Tréville and the guardroom of the Louvre with the accounts of his love
scrapes, of which Athos never spoke; and at the present moment, after having
passed from professional ladies to military ladies, from the lawyer’s dame to the
baroness, there was question of nothing less with Porthos than a foreign princess,
who was enormously fond of him.

An old proverb says, “Like master like man.” Let us pass, then, from the valet
of Athos to the valet of Porthos, from Grimaud to Mousqueton.

Mousqueton was a Norman, whose pacific name of Boniface his master had

changed into the infinitely more sonorous name of Mousqueton. He had entered
the service of Porthos upon condition that he should only be clothed and lodged,
though in a handsome manner; but he claimed two hours a day to himself,
consecrated to an employment which would provide for his other wants. Porthos
agreed to the bargain; the thing suited him wonderfully well. He had doublets cut
out of his old clothes and cast-off cloaks for Mousqueton, and thanks to a very
intelligent tailor, who made his clothes look as good as new by turning them, and
whose wife was suspected of wishing to make Porthos descend from his
aristocratic habits, Mousqueton made a very good figure when attending on his
master.

As for Aramis, of whom we believe we have sufficiently explained the
character—a character which, like that of his companions, we shall be able to
follow in its development—his lackey was called Bazin. Thanks to the hopes
which his master entertained of someday entering into orders, he was always
clothed in black, as became the servant of a churchman. He was a Berrichon,
thirty-five or forty years old, mild, peaceable, sleek, employing the leisure his
master left him in the perusal of pious works, providing rigorously for two a
dinner of few dishes, but excellent. For the rest, he was dumb, blind, and deaf,
and of unimpeachable fidelity.

And now that we are acquainted, superficially at least, with the masters and
the valets, let us pass on to the dwellings occupied by each of them.

Athos dwelt in the Rue Férou, within two steps of the Luxembourg. His
apartment consisted of two small chambers, very nicely fitted up, in a furnished
house, the hostess of which, still young and still really handsome, cast tender
glances uselessly at him. Some fragments of past splendor appeared here and
there upon the walls of this modest lodging; a sword, for example, richly
embossed, which belonged by its make to the times of Francis I, the hilt of
which alone, encrusted with precious stones, might be worth two hundred
pistoles, and which, nevertheless, in his moments of greatest distress Athos had
never pledged or offered for sale. It had long been an object of ambition for
Porthos. Porthos would have given ten years of his life to possess this sword.

One day, when he had an appointment with a duchess, he endeavored even to
borrow it of Athos. Athos, without saying anything, emptied his pockets, got
together all his jewels, purses, aiguillettes, and gold chains, and offered them all
to Porthos; but as to the sword, he said it was sealed to its place and should never
quit it until its master should himself quit his lodgings. In addition to the sword,
there was a portrait representing a nobleman of the time of Henry III, dressed
with the greatest elegance, and who wore the Order of the Holy Ghost; and this

portrait had certain resemblances of lines with Athos, certain family likenesses
which indicated that this great noble, a knight of the Order of the King, was his
ancestor.

Besides these, a casket of magnificent goldwork, with the same arms as the
sword and the portrait, formed a middle ornament to the mantelpiece, and
assorted badly with the rest of the furniture. Athos always carried the key of this
coffer about him; but he one day opened it before Porthos, and Porthos was
convinced that this coffer contained nothing but letters and papers—love letters
and family papers, no doubt.

Porthos lived in an apartment, large in size and of very sumptuous appearance,
in the Rue du Vieux-Colombier. Every time he passed with a friend before his
windows, at one of which Mousqueton was sure to be placed in full livery,
Porthos raised his head and his hand, and said, “That is my abode!” But he was
never to be found at home; he never invited anybody to go up with him, and no
one could form an idea of what this sumptuous apartment contained in the shape
of real riches.

As to Aramis, he dwelt in a little lodging composed of a boudoir, an eating
room, and a bedroom, which room, situated, as the others were, on the ground
floor, looked out upon a little fresh green garden, shady and impenetrable to the
eyes of his neighbors.

With regard to D’Artagnan, we know how he was lodged, and we have
already made acquaintance with his lackey, Master Planchet.

D’Artagnan, who was by nature very curious—as people generally are who
possess the genius of intrigue—did all he could to make out who Athos, Porthos,
and Aramis really were (for under these pseudonyms each of these young men
concealed his family name)—Athos in particular, who, a league away, savored
of nobility. He addressed himself then to Porthos to gain information respecting
Athos and Aramis, and to Aramis in order to learn something of Porthos.

Unfortunately Porthos knew nothing of the life of his silent companion but
what revealed itself. It was said Athos had met with great crosses in love, and
that a frightful treachery had forever poisoned the life of this gallant man. What
could this treachery be? All the world was ignorant of it.

As to Porthos, except his real name, which no one but M. de Tréville was
acquainted with (as was the case with those of his two comrades), his life was
very easily known. Vain and indiscreet, it was as easy to see through him as
through a crystal. The only thing to mislead the investigator would have been
belief in all the good things he said of himself.

With respect to Aramis, though having the air of having nothing secret about
him, he was a young fellow made up of mysteries, answering little to questions
put to him about others, and eluding those that concerned himself. One day
D’Artagnan, having for a long time interrogated him about Porthos, and having
learned from him the report which prevailed concerning the success of the
Musketeer with a princess, wished to gain a little insight into the amorous
adventures of his interlocutor. “And you, my dear companion,” said he, “you
who speak of the baronesses, countesses, and princesses of others?”

“Pardieu! I spoke of them because Porthos talked of them himself, because he
has paraded all these fine things before me. But be assured, my dear Monsieur
d’Artagnan, that if I had obtained them from any other source, or if they had
been confided to me, there exists no confessor more discreet than myself. ”

“Oh, I don’t doubt that,” replied D’Artagnan; “but it seems to me that you are
tolerably familiar with coats of arms—a certain embroidered handkerchief, for
instance, to which I owe the honor of your acquaintance?”

This time Aramis was not angry, but assumed the most modest air and replied
in a friendly tone, “My dear friend, do not forget that I wish to belong to the
Church, and that I avoid all mundane opportunities. The handkerchief you saw
had not been given to me, but it had been forgotten and left at my house by one
of my friends. I was obliged to pick it up in order not to compromise him and the
lady be loves. As for myself, I neither have, nor desire to have, a mistress,
following in that respect the very judicious example of Athos, who has none any
more than I have.”

“But what the devil! you are not a priest, you are a Musketeer!”

“A Musketeer for a time, my friend, as the cardinal says, a Musketeer against
my will, but a churchman at heart, believe me. Athos and Porthos dragged me
into this to occupy me. I had, at the moment of being ordained, a little difficulty
with—

—But that would not interest you, and I am taking up your valuable time”

“Not at all; it interests me very much,” cried D’Artagnan; “and at this moment
I have absolutely nothing to do.”

“Yes, but I have my breviary to repeat,” answered Aramis; “then some verses
to compose, which Madame d’Aiguillon begged of me. Then I must go to the
Rue St. Honoré in order to purchase some rouge for Madame de Chevreuse. So
you see, my dear friend, that if you are not in a hurry, I am very much in a
hurry.”

Aramis held out his hand in a cordial manner to his young companion, and

took leave of him.

Notwithstanding all the pains he took, D’Artagnan was unable to learn any
more concerning his three new-made friends. He formed, therefore, the
resolution of believing for the present all that was said of their past, hoping for
more certain and extended revelations in the future. In the meanwhile, he looked
upon Athos as an Achilles, Porthos as an Ajax, and Aramis as a Joseph.

As to the rest, the life of the four young friends was joyous enough. Athos
played, and that as a rule unfortunately. Nevertheless, he never borrowed a sou
of his companions, although his purse was ever at their service; and when he had
played upon honor, he always awakened his creditor by six o’clock the next
morning to pay the debt of the preceding evening.

Porthos had his fits. On the days when he won he was insolent and
ostentatious; if he lost, he disappeared completely for several days, after which
he reappeared with a pale face and thinner person, but with money in his purse.

As to Aramis, he never played. He was the worst Musketeer and the most
unconvivial companion imaginable. He had always something or other to do.
Sometimes in the midst of dinner, when everyone, under the attraction of wine
and in the warmth of conversation, believed they had two or three hours longer
to enjoy themselves at table, Aramis looked at his watch, arose with a bland
smile, and took leave of the company, to go, as he said, to consult a casuist with
whom he had an appointment. At other times he would return home to write a
treatise, and requested his friends not to disturb him.

At this Athos would smile, with his charming, melancholy smile, which so
became his noble countenance, and Porthos would drink, swearing that Aramis
would never be anything but a village curé.

Planchet, D‘Artagnan’s valet, supported his good fortune nobly. He received
thirty sous per day, and for a month he returned to his lodgings gay as a
chaffinch, and affable toward his master. When the wind of adversity began to
blow upon the housekeeping of the Rue des Fossoyeurs—that is to say, when the
forty pistoles of King Louis XIII were consumed or nearly so—he commenced
complaints which Athos thought nauseous, Porthos indecent, and Aramis
ridiculous. Athos counseled D’Artagnan to dismiss the fellow; Porthos was of
opinion that he should give him a good thrashing first; and Aramis contended
that a master should never attend to anything but the civilities paid to him.

“This is all very easy for you to say,” replied D’Artagnan, “for you, Athos,
who live like a dumb man with Grimaud, who forbid him to speak, and
consequently never exchange ill words with him; for you, Porthos, who carry

matters in such a magnificent style, and are a god to your valet, Mousqueton;
and for you, Aramis who, always abstracted by your theological studies, inspire
your servant, Bazin, a mild, religious man, with a profound respect; but for me,
who am without any settled means and without resources—for me, who am
neither a Musketeer nor even a Guardsman, what am I to do to inspire either the
affection, the terror, or the respect in Planchet?”

“This is serious,” answered the three friends; “it is a family affair. It is with
valets as with wives, they must be placed at once upon the footing in which you
wish them to remain. Reflect upon it.”

D‘Artagnan did reflect, and resolved to thrash Planchet provisionally; which
he did with the conscientiousness that D’Artagnan carried into everything. After
having well beaten him, he forbade him to leave his service without his
permission. “For,” added he, “the future cannot fail to mend; I inevitably look
for better times. Your fortune is therefore made if you remain with me, and I am
too good a master to allow you to miss such a chance by granting you the
dismissal you require.”

This manner of acting roused much respect for D’Artagnan’s policy among
the Musketeers. Planchet was equally seized with admiration, and said no more
about going away.

The life of the four young men had become fraternal. D’Artagnan, who had no
settled habits of his own, as he came from his province into the midst of a world
quite new to him, fell easily into the habits of his friends.

They rose about eight o‘clock in the winter, about six in summer, and went to
take the countersignn and see how things went on at M. de Tréville’s.
D’Artagnan, although he was not a Musketeer, performed the duty of one with
remarkable punctuality. He went on guard because he always kept company with
whoever of his friends was on duty. He was well known at the Hotel of the
Musketeers, where everyone considered him a good comrade. M. de Tréville,
who had appreciated him at the first glance and who bore him a real affection,
never ceased recommending him to the king.

On their side, the three Musketeers were much attached to their young
comrade. The friendship which united these four men, and the want they felt of
seeing one another three or four times a day, whether for dueling, business, or
pleasure, caused them to be continually running after one another like shadows;
and the Inseparables were constantly to be met with seeking one another, from
the Luxembourg to the Place St. Sulpice, or from the Rue du Vieux-Colombier
to the Luxembourg.

In the meanwhile the promises of M. de Tréville went on prosperously. One
fine morning the king commanded M. le Chevalier Dessessart to admit
D’Artagnan as a cadet in his company of Guards. D‘Artagnan, with a sigh,
donned his uniform, which he would have exchanged for that of a Musketeer at
the expense of ten years of his existence. But M. de Tréville promised this favor
after a novitiate of two years—a novitiate which might besides be abridged if an
opportunity should present itself for D’Artagnan to render the king any signal
service, or to distinguish himself by some brilliant action. Upon this promise
D’Artagnan withdrew, and the next day he began service.

Then it became the turn of Athos, Porthos, and Aramis to mount guard with
D‘Artagnan when he was on duty. The company of M. le Chevalier Dessessart
thus received four instead of one when it admitted D’Artagnan.

8

CONCERNING A COURT INTRIGUE

In the meantime, the forty pistoles of King Louis XIII, like all other things of
this world, after having had a beginning had an end, and after this end our four
companions began to be somewhat embarrassed. At first, Athos supported the
association for a time with his own means.

Porthos succeeded him; and thanks to one of those disappearances to which he
was accustomed, he was able to provide for the wants of all for a fortnight. At
last it became Aramis’s turn, who performed it with a good grace and who
succeeded—as he said, by selling some theological books—in procuring a few
pistoles.

Then, as they had been accustomed to do, they had recourse to M. de Tréville,
who made some advances on their pay; but these advances could not go far with
three Musketeers who were already much in arrears and a Guardsman who as yet
had no pay at all.

At length when they found they were likely to be really in want, they got
together, as a last effort, eight or ten pistoles, with which Porthos went to the
gaming table. Unfortunately he was in a bad vein; he lost all, together with
twenty-five pistoles for which he had given his word.

Then the inconvenience became distress. The hungry friends, followed by
their lackeys, were seen haunting the quays and Guard rooms, picking up among
their friends abroad all the dinners they could meet with; for according to the
advice of Aramis, it was prudent to sow repasts right and left in prosperity, in
order to reap a few in time of need.

Athos was invited four times, and each time took his friends and their lackeys
with him. Porthos had six occasions, and contrived in the same manner that his
friends should partake of them; Aramis had eight of them. He was a man, as
must have been already perceived, who made but little noise, and yet was much
sought after.

As to D‘Artagnan, who as yet knew nobody in the capital, he only found one
chocolate breakfast at the house of a priest of his own province, and one dinner

at the house of a cornet of the Guards. He took his army to the priest’s, where
they devoured as much provision as would have lasted him for two months, and
to the cornet’s, who performed wonders; but as Planchet said, “People do not eat
at once for all time, even when they eat a good deal.”

D’Artagnan thus felt himself humiliated in having only procured one meal and
a half for his companions—as the breakfast at the priest’s could only be counted
as half a repast—in return for the feasts which Athos, Porthos, and Aramis had
procured him. He fancied himself a burden to the society, forgetting in his
perfectly juvenile good faith that he had fed this society for a month; and he set
his mind actively to work. He reflected that this coalition of four young, brave,
enterprising, and active men ought to have some other object than swaggering
walks, fencing lessons, and practical jokes, more or less witty.

In fact, four men such as they were—four men devoted to one another, from
their purses to their lives; four men always supporting one another, never
yielding, executing singly or together the resolutions formed in common; four
arms threatening the four cardinal points, or turning toward a single point—must
inevitably, either subterraneously, in open day, by mining, in the trench, by
cunning, or by force, open themselves a way toward the object they wished to
attain, however well it might be defended, or however distant it might seem. The
only thing that astonished D’Artagnan was that his friends had never yet thought
of this.

He was thinking by himself, and even seriously racking his brain to find a
direction for this single force four times multiplied, with which he did not doubt,
as with the lever for which Archimedes sought, they should succeed in moving
the world, when someone tapped gently at his door. D‘Artagnan awakened
Planchet and ordered him to open it.

From this phrase, “D’Artagnan awakened Planchet,” the reader must not
suppose it was night, or that day was hardly come. No, it had just struck four.
Planchet, two hours before, had asked his master for some dinner, and he had
answered him with the proverb, “He who sleeps, dines.” And Planchet dined by
sleeping.

A man was introduced of simple mien, who had the appearance of a
tradesman. Planchet, by way of dessert, would have liked to hear the
conversation; but the citizen declared to D’Artagnan that what he had to say
being important and confidential, he desired to be left alone with him.

D‘Artagnan dismissed Planchet, and requested his visitor to be seated. There
was a moment of silence, during which the two men looked at each other, as if to
make a preliminary acquaintance, after which D’Artagnan bowed, as a sign that

he listened.

“I have heard Monsieur d’Artagnan spoken of as a very brave young man,”
said the citizen; “and this reputation which he justly enjoys has decided me to
confide a secret to him.”

“Speak, monsieur, speak,” said D’Artagnan, who instinctively scented
something advantageous.

The citizen made a fresh pause and continued, “I have a wife who is
seamstress to the queen, monsieur, and who is not deficient in either virtue or
beauty. I was induced to marry her about three years ago, although she had but
very little dowry, because Monsieur Laporte, the queen’s cloak bearer, is her
godfather, and befriends her.”

“Well, monsieur?” asked D’Artagnan.

“Well!” resumed the citizen, “well, monsieur, my wife was abducted
yesterday morning, as she was coming out of her work-room.”

“And by whom was your wife abducted?”

“I know nothing surely, monsieur, but I suspect someone.”

“And who is the person whom you suspect?”

“A man who has pursued her a long time.”

“The devil!”

“But allow me to tell you, monsieur,” continued the citizen, “that I am
convinced that there is less love than politics in all this.”

“Less love than politics,” replied D’Artagnan, with a reflective air; “and what
do you suspect?”

“I do not know whether I ought to tell you what I suspect.”

“Monsieur, I beg you to observe that I ask you absolutely nothing. It is you
who have come to me. It is you who have told me that you had a secret to
confide to me. Act, then, as you think proper; there is still time to withdraw.”

“No, monsieur, no; you appear to be an honest young man, and I will have
confidence in you. I believe, then, that it is not on account of any intrigues of her
own that my wife has been arrested, but because of those of a lady much greater
than herself.”

“Ah, ah! can it be on account of the amours of Madame de Bois-Tracy?” said
D’Artagnan, wishing to have the air, in the eyes of the citizen, of being posted as
to court affairs.

“Higher, monsieur, higher.”

“Of Madame d’Aiguillon?”

“Still higher.”
“Of Madame de Chevreuse?”
“Higher, much higher.”
“Of the—” D’Artagnan checked himself.
“Yes, monsieur,” replied the terrified citizen, in a tone so low that he was
scarcely audible.
“And with whom?”
“With whom can it be, if not with the Duke of—”
“The Duke of ”
“Yes, monsieur,” replied the citizen, giving a still fainter intonation to his
voice.
“But how do you know all this?”
“How do I know it?”
“Yes, how do you know it? No half-confidence, or—you understand ! ”
“I know it from my wife, monsieur—from my wife herself.”
“Who learns it from whom?”
“From Monsieur Laporte. Did I not tell you that she was the goddaughter of
Monsieur Laporte, the confidential man of the queen? Well, Monsieur Laporte
placed her near her Majesty in order that our poor queen might at least have
someone in whom she could place confidence, abandoned as she is by the king,
watched as she is by the cardinal, betrayed as she is by everybody.”
“Ah, ah! it begins to develop itself,” said D’Artagnan.
“Now, my wife came home four days ago, monsieur. One of her conditions
was that she should come and see me twice a week; for, as I had the honor to tell
you, my wife loves me dearly—my wife, then, came and confided to me that the
queen at that very moment entertained great fears.”
“Truly!”
“Yes. The cardinal, as it appears, pursues her and persecutes her more than
ever. He cannot pardon her the history of the Saraband. You know the history of
the Saraband?”o
“Pardieu! know it!” replied D’Artagnan, who knew nothing about it, but who
wished to appear to know everything that was going on.
“So that now it is no longer hatred, but vengeance.”
“Indeed!”
“And the queen believes—”

“Well, what does the queen believe?”

“She believes that someone has written to the Duke of Buckingham in her
name.”

“In the queen’s name?”

“Yes, to make him come to Paris; and when once come to Paris, to draw him
into some snare.”

“The devil! But your wife, monsieur, what has she to do with all this?”

“Her devotion to the queen is known; and they wish either to remove her from
her mistress, or to intimidate her, in order to obtain her Majesty’s secrets, or to
seduce her and make use of her as a spy.”

“That is likely,” said D’Artagnan; “but the man who has abducted her—do
you know him?”

“I have told you that I believe I know him.”

“His name?”

“I do not know that; what I do know is that he is a creature of the cardinal, his
evil genius.”

“But you have seen him?”

“Yes, my wife pointed him out to me one day.”

“Has he anything remarkable about him by which one may recognize him?”

“Oh, certainly; he is a noble of very lofty carriage, black hair, swarthy
complexion, piercing eye, white teeth, and has a scar on his temple.”

“A scar on his temple!” cried D’Artagnan; “and with that, white teeth, a
piercing eye, dark complexion, black hair, and haughty carriage—why, that’s my
man of Meung.”

“He is your man, do you say?”

“Yes, yes; but that has nothing to do with it. No, I am wrong. On the contrary,
that simplifies the matter greatly. If your man is mine, with one blow I shall
obtain two revenges, that’s all; but where to find this man?”

“I know not.”

“Have you no information as to his abiding place?”

“None. One day, as I was conveying my wife back to the Louvre, he was
coming out as she was going in, and she showed him to me.”

“The devil! the devil!” murmured D’Artagnan; “all this is vague enough.
From whom have you learned of the abduction of your wife?”

“From Monsieur Laporte.”

“Did he give you any details?”
“He knew none himself.”
“And you have learned nothing from any other quarter?”
“Yes, I have received—”
“What?”
“I fear I am committing a great imprudence.”
“You always come back to that; but I must make you see this time that it is
too late to retreat.”
“I do not retreat, mordieu!” cried the citizen, swearing in order to rouse his
courage. “Besides, by the faith of Bonacieux—”
“You call yourself Bonacieux?” interrupted D’Artagnan.
“Yes, that is my name.”
“You said, then, by the word of Bonacieux. Pardon me for interrupting you,
but it appears to me that that name is familiar to me.”
“Possibly, monsieur. I am your landlord.”
“Ah, ah!” said D’Artagnan, half rising and bowing; “you are my landlord?”
“Yes, monsieur, yes. And as it is three months since you have been here, and
though, distracted as you must be in your important occupations, you have
forgotten to pay me my rent—as, I say, I have not tormented you a single instant,
I thought you would appreciate my delicacy.”
“How can it be otherwise, my dear Bonacieux?” replied D’Artagnan; “trust
me, I am fully grateful for such unparalleled conduct, and if, as I have told you, I
can be of any service to you—”
“I believe you, monsieur, I believe you; and as I was about to say, by the word
of Bonacieux, I have confidence in you.”
“Finish, then, what you were about to say.”
The citizen took a paper from his pocket, and presented it to D’Artagnan.
“A letter?” said the young man.
“Which I received this morning.”
D’Artagnan opened it, and as the day was beginning to decline, he approached
the window to read it. The citizen followed him.
“ ‘Do not seek your wife,’ read D‘Artagnan; ” ’she will be restored to you
when there is no longer occasion for her. If you make a single step to find her
you are lost.’ ”
“That’s pretty positive,” continued D’Artagnan; “but after all, it is but a

menace.”

“Yes; but that menace terrifies me. I am not a fighting man at all, monsieur,
and I am afraid of the Bastille.”

“Hum!” said D’Artagnan. “I have no greater regard for the Bastille than you.
If it were nothing but a sword thrust, why then—”

“I have counted upon you on this occasion, monsieur.”

“Yes?”

“Seeing you constantly surrounded by Musketeers of a very superb
appearance, and knowing that these Musketeers belong to Monsieur de Tréville,
and were consequently enemies of the cardinal, I thought that you and your
friends, while rendering justice to our poor queen, would be pleased to play his
Eminence an ill turn.”

“Without doubt.”

“And then I have thought that considering three months’ lodging, about which
I have said nothing—”

“Yes, yes; you have already given me that reason, and I find it excellent.”

“Reckoning still further, that as long as you do me the honor to remain in my
house I shall never speak to you about rent—”

“Very kind!”

“And adding to this, if there be need of it, meaning to offer you fifty pistoles,
if, against all probability, you should be short at the present moment.”

“Admirable! you are rich then, my dear Monsieur Bonacieux?”

“I am comfortably off, monsieur, that’s all; I have scraped together some such
thing as an income of two or three thousand crown in the haberdashery business,
but more particularly in venturing some funds in the last voyage of the
celebrated navigator Jean Moquet; so that you understand, monsieur—But!”
cried the citizen.

“What!” demanded D’Artagnan.

“Whom do I see yonder?”

“Where?”

“In the street, facing your window, in the embrasure of that door—a man
wrapped in a cloak.”

“It is he!” cried D’Artagnan and the citizen at the same time, each having
recognized his man.

“Ah, this time,” cried D’Artagnan, springing to his sword, “this time he will

not escape me!”

Drawing his sword from its scabbard, he rushed out of the apartment. On the
staircase he met Athos and Porthos, who were coming to see him. They
separated, and D’Artagnan rushed between them like a dart.

“Pah! where are you going?” cried the two Musketeers in a breath.

“The man of Meung! replied D’Artagnan, and disappeared.

D’Artagnan had more than once related to his friends his adventure with the
stranger, as well as the apparition of the beautiful foreigner, to whom this man
had confided some important missive.

The opinion of Athos was that D‘Artagnan had lost his letter in the skirmish.
A gentleman, in his opinion—and according to D’Artagnan’s portrait of him, the
stranger must be a gentleman—would be incapable of the baseness of stealing a
letter.

Porthos saw nothing in all this but a love meeting, given by a lady to a
cavalier, or by a cavalier to a lady, which had been disturbed by the presence of
D’Artagnan and his yellow horse. Aramis said that as these sorts of affairs were
mysterious, it was better not to fathom them.

They understood, then, from the few words which escaped from D‘Artagnan,
what affair was in hand, and as they thought that after overtaking his man, or
losing sight of him, D’Artagnan would return to his rooms, they kept on their
way.

When they entered D‘Artagnan’s chamber, it was empty; the landlord,
dreading the consequences of the encounter which was doubtless about to take
place between the young man and the stranger, had, consistent with the character
he had given himself, judged it prudent to decamp.

9

D’ARTAGNAN SHOWS HIMSELF

As Athos and Porthos had foreseen, at the expiration of a half hour D‘Artagnan
returned. He had again missed his man, who had disappeared as if by
enchantment. D’Artagnan had run, sword in hand, through all the neighboring
streets, but had found nobody resembling the man he sought for. Then he came
back to the point where, perhaps, he ought to have begun, and that was to knock
at the door against which the stranger had leaned; but this proved useless—for
though he knocked ten or twelve times in succession, no one answered, and
some of the neighbors, who put their noses out of their windows or were brought
to their doors by the noise, had assured him that that house, all the openings of
which were tightly closed, had not been inhabited for six months.

While D’Artagnan was running through the streets and knocking at doors,
Aramis had joined his companions; so that on returning home D’Artagnan found
the reunion complete.

“Well!” cried the three Musketeers all together, on seeing D’Artagnan enter
with his brow covered with perspiration and his countenance upset with anger.

“Well! cried he, throwing his sword upon the bed, ”this man must be the devil
in person; he has disappeared like a phantom, like a shade, like a specter.”

“Do you believe in apparitions?” asked Athos of Porthos.
“I never believe in anything I have not seen, and as I never have seen
apparitions, I don’t believe in them.”
“The Bible,” said Aramis, “makes our belief in them a law; the ghost of
Samuel appeared to Saul, and it is an article of faith that I should be very sorry to
see any doubt thrown upon, Porthos.”
“At all events, man or devil, body or shadow, illusion or reality, this man is
born for my damnation; for his flight has caused us to miss a glorious affair,
gentlemen—an affair by which there were a hundred pistoles, and perhaps more,
to be gained.”
“How is that?” cried Porthos and Aramis in a breath.

As to Athos, faithful to his system of reticence, he contented himself with
interrogating D’Artagnan by a look.

“Planchet,” said D’Artagnan to his domestic, who just then insinuated his
head through the half-open door in order to catch some fragments of the
conversation, “go down to my landlord, Monsieur Bonacieux, and ask him to
send me half a dozen bottles of Beaugency wine; I prefer that.”

“Ah, ha! you have credit with your landlord, then?” asked Porthos.

“Yes,” replied D’Artagnan, “from this very day; and mind, if the wine is bad,
we will send to him to find better.”

“We must use, and not abuse,” said Aramis, sententiously.

“I always said that D‘Artagnan had the longest head of the four,” said Athos,
who, having uttered his opinion, to which D’Artagnan replied with a bow,
immediately resumed his accustomed silence.

“But come, what is this about?” asked Porthos.

“Yes,” said Aramis, “impart it to us, my dear friend, unless the honor of any
lady be hazarded by this confidence; in that case you would do better to keep it
to yourself.”

“Be satisfied,” replied D’Artagnan; “the honor of no one will have cause to
complain of what I have to tell.”

He then related to his friends, word for word, all that had passed between him
and his host, and how the man who had abducted the wife of his worthy landlord
was the same with whom he had had the difference at the hostelry of the Jolly
Miller.

“Your affair is not bad,” said Athos, after having tasted like a connoisseur and
indicated by a nod of his head that he thought the wine good; “and one may draw
fifty or sixty pistoles from this good man. Then there only remains to ascertain
whether these fifty or sixty pistoles are worth the risk of four heads.”

“But observe,” cried D’Artagnan, “that there is a woman in the affair—a
woman carried off, a woman who is doubtless threatened, tortured perhaps, and
all because she is faithful to her mistress.”

“Beware, D’Artagnan, beware,” said Aramis. “You grow a little too warm, in
my opinion, about the fate of Madame Bonacieux. Woman was created for our
destruction, and it is from her we inherit all our miseries.”

At this speech of Aramis, the brow of Athos became clouded and he bit his
lips.

“It is not Madame Bonacieux about whom I am anxious,” cried D’Artagnan,

“but the queen, whom the king abandons, whom the cardinal persecutes, and
who sees the heads of all her friends fall, one after the other.”

“Why does she love what we hate most in the world, the Spaniards and the
English?”

“Spain is her country,” replied D’Artagnan; “and it is very natural that she
should love the Spanish, who are the children of the same soil as herself. As to
the second reproach, I have heard it said that she does not love the English, but
an Englishman.”

“Well, and by my faith,” said Athos, “it must be acknowledged that this
Englishman is worthy of being loved. I never saw a man with a nobler air than
his.”

“Without reckoning that he dresses as nobody else can,” said Porthos. “I was
at the Louvre on the day when he scattered his pearls;16 and, pardieu, I picked
up two that I sold for ten pistoles each. Do you know him, Aramis?”

“As well as you do, gentlemen; for I was among those who seized him in the
garden at Amiens, into which Monsieur Putange, the queen’s equerry,
introduced me.17 I was at school at the time, and the adventure appeared to me to
be cruel for the king.”

“Which would not prevent me,” said D’Artagnan, “if I knew where the Duke
of Buckingham was, from taking him by the hand and conducting him to the
queen, were it only to enrage the cardinal. For our true, our only, our eternal
enemy, gentlemen, is the cardinal, and if we could find means to play him a
sharp turn, I vow that I would voluntarily risk my head in doing it.”

“And did the mercer, ”prejoined Athos, “tell you, D’Artagnan, that the queen
thought that Buckingham had been brought over by a forged letter?”

“She is afraid so.”

“Wait a minute, then,” said Aramis.

“What for?” demanded Porthos.

“Go on, while I endeavor to recall certain circumstances.”

“And now I am convinced,” said D’Artagnan, “that this abduction of the
queen’s woman is connected with the events of which we are speaking, and
perhaps with the presence of Buckingham in Paris.”

“The Gascon is full of ideas,” said Porthos, with admiration.

“I like to hear him talk,” said Athos; “his dialect amuses me.”

“Gentlemen,” cried Aramis, “listen to this.”

“Listen to Aramis,” said his three friends.

“Yesterday I was at the house of a doctor of theology, whom I sometimes
consult about my studies.”

Athos smiled.

“He resides in a quiet quarter,” continued Aramis; “his tastes and his
profession require it. Now, at the moment when I left his house—”

Here Aramis paused.

“Well,” cried his auditors; “at the moment you left his house?”

Aramis appeared to make a strong inward effort, like a man who, in the full
relation of a falsehood, finds himself stopped by some unforeseen obstacle; but
the eyes of his three companions were fixed upon him, their ears were wide
open, and there were no means of retreat.

“This doctor has a niece,” continued Aramis.

“Ah, he has a niece!” interrupted Porthos.

“A very respectable lady,” said Aramis.

The three friends burst into laughter.

“Ah, if you laugh, if you doubt me,” replied Amaris, “you shall know
nothing.”

“We believe like Mohammedans, and are as mute as tomb-stones,” said
Athos.

“I will continue, then,” resumed Aramis. “This niece comes sometimes to see
her uncle; and by chance was there yesterday at the same time that I was, and it
was my duty to offer to conduct her to her carriage.”

“Ah! She has a carriage, then, this niece of the doctor?” interrupted Porthos,
one of whose faults was a great looseness of tongue. “A nice acquaintance, my
friend!”

“Porthos,” replied Aramis, “I have had the occasion to observe to you more
than once that you are very indiscreet; and that is injurious to you among the
women.”

“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” cried D’Artagnan, who began to get a glimpse of the
result of the adventure, “the thing is serious. Let us try not to jest, if we can. Go
on Aramis, go on.”

“All at once, a tall, dark gentleman—just like yours, D’Artagnan.”

“The same, perhaps,” said he.

“Possibly,” continued Aramis, “came toward me, accompanied by five or six

men who followed about ten paces behind him; and in the politest tone,
‘Monsieur Duke,’ said he to me, ‘and you madame,’ continued he, addressing
the lady on my arm—”

“The doctor’s niece?”

“Hold your tongue, Porthos,” said Athos; “you are insupportable.”

“ ‘—will you enter this carriage, and that without offering the least resistance,
without making the least noise?’ ”

“He took you for Buckingham!” cried D’Artagnan.

“I believe so,” replied Aramis.

“But the lady?” asked Porthos.

“He took her for the queen!” said D’Artagnan.

“Just so,” replied Aramis.

“The Gascon is the devil!” cried Athos; “nothing escapes him.”

“The fact is,” said Porthos, “Aramis is of the same height, and something of
the shape of the duke; but it nevertheless appears to me that the dress of a
Musketeer—”

“I wore an enormous cloak,” said Aramis.

“In the month of July? the devil!” said Porthos. “Is the doctor afraid that you
may be recognized?”

“I can comprehend that the spy may have been deceived by the person; but the
face—”

“I had a large hat,” said Aramis.

“Oh, good Lord,” cried Porthos, “what precautions for the study of theology!
”

“Gentlemen, gentlemen,” said D’Artagnan, “do not let us lose our time in
jesting. Let us separate, and let us seek the mercer’s wife—that is the key of the
intrigue.”

“A woman of such inferior condition! Can you believe so?” said Porthos,
protruding his lips with contempt.

“She is goddaughter to Laporte, the confidential valet of the queen. Have I not
told you so, gentlemen? Besides, it has perhaps been her Majesty’s calculation to
seek on this occasion for support so lowly. High heads expose themselves from
afar, and the cardinal is longsighted.”

“Well,” said Porthos, “in the first place make a bargain with the mercer, and a
good bargain.”

“That’s useless,” said D’Artagnan; “for I believe if he does not pay us, we
shall be well enough paid by another party.”

At this moment a sudden noise of footsteps was heard upon the stairs; the door
was thrown violently open, and the unfortunate mercer rushed into the chamber
in which the council was held.

“Save me, gentlemen, for the love of heaven, save me!” cried he. “There are
four men come to arrest me. Save me! save me!”

Porthos and Aramis arose.

“A moment,” cried D’Artagnan, making them a sign to replace in the scabbard
their half-drawn swords. “It is not courage that is needed; it is prudence.”

“And yet,” cried Porthos, “we will not leave—”

“You will leave D‘Artagnan to act as he thinks proper,” said Athos. “He has, I
repeat, the longest head of the four, and for my part I declare that I will obey
him. Do as you think best, D’Artagnan.”

At this moment the four Guards appeared at the door of the antechamber, but
seeing four Musketeers standing, and their swords by their sides, they hesitated
about going farther.

“Come in, gentlemen, come in,” called D’Artagnan; “you are here in my
apartment, and we are all faithful servants of the king and cardinal.”

“Then, gentlemen, you will not oppose our executing the orders we have
received?” asked one who appeared to be the leader of the party.

“On the contrary, gentlemen, we would assist you if it were necessary.”

“What does he say?” grumbled Porthos.

“You are a simpleton,” said Athos. “Silence!”

“But you promised me—” whispered the poor mercer.

“We can only save you by being free ourselves,” replied D’Artagnan, in a
rapid, low tone; “and if we appear inclined to defend you, they will arrest us
with you.”

“It seems, nevertheless—”

“Come, gentlemen, come!” said D’Artagnan, aloud; “I have no motive for
defending Monsieur. I saw him today for the first time, and he can tell you on
what occasion; he came to demand the rent of my lodging. Is not that true,
Monsieur Bonacieux ? Answer!”

“That is the very truth,” cried the mercer; “but Monsieur does not tell you—”

“Silence, with respect to me; silence, with respect to my friends; silence about
the queen, above all, or you will ruin everybody without saving yourself! Come,

come, gentlemen, remove the fellow.” And D’Artagnan pushed the half-
stupefied mercer among the Guards, saying to him, “You are a shabby old
fellow, my dear. You come to demand money of me—of a Musketeer! To prison
with him! Gentlemen, once more, take him to prison, and keep him under key as
long as possible; that will give me time to pay him.”

The officers were full of thanks, and took away their prey. As they were going
down D’Artagnan laid his hand on the shoulder of their leader.

“May I not drink to your health, and you to mine?” said D’Artagnan, filling
two glasses with the Beaugency wine which he had obtained from the liberality
of M. Bonacieux.

“That will do me great honor,” said the leader of the posse, “and I accept
thankfully.”

“Then to yours, monsieur—what is your name?”

“Boisrenard.”

“Monsieur Boisrenard.”

“To yours, my gentleman! What is your name, in your turn, if you please?”

“D’Artagnan.”

“To yours, monsieur.”

“And above all others,” cried D’Artagnan, as if carried away by his
enthusiasm, “to that of the king and the cardinal.”

The leader of the posse would perhaps have doubted the sincerity of
D’Artagnan if the wine had been bad; but the wine was good, and he was
convinced.

“What diabolical villainy you have performed here,” said Porthos, when the
officer had rejoined his companions and the four friends found themselves alone.
“Shame, shame, for four Musketeers to allow an unfortunate fellow who cried
for help to be arrested in their midst! And a gentleman to hobnob with a bailiff!”

“Porthos,” said Aramis, “Athos has already told you that you are a simpleton,
and I am quite of his opinion. D’Artagnan, you are a great man; and when you
occupy Monsieur de Treville’s place, I will come and ask your influence to
secure me an abbey.”

“Well, I am in a maze,” said Porthos; “do you approve of what D’Artagnan
has done?”

“Parbleu! indeed I do,” said Athos; “I not only approve of what he has done,
but I congratulate him upon it.”

“And now, gentlemen,” said D’Artagnan, without stopping to explain his

conduct to Porthos, “All for one, one for all—that is our motto, is it not?”

“And yet—” said Porthos. “Hold out your hand and swear!” cried Athos and
Aramis at once.

Overcome by example, grumbling to himself, nevertheless, Porthos stretched
out his hand, and the four friends repeated with one voice the formula dictated
by D’Artagnan:

“All for one, one for all.”

“That’s well! Now let everyone retire to his own home,” said D’Artagnan, as
if he had done nothing but command all his life; “and attention! for from this
moment we are at feud with the cardinal.”

10

A MOUSETRAP IN THE SEVENTEENTH CENTURY

The invention of the mousetrap does not date from our days; as soon as
societies, in forming, had invented any kind of police, that police invented
mousetraps.

As perhaps our readers are not familiar with the slang of the Rue de
Jerusalem, and as it is fifteen years since we applied this word for the first time
to this thing, allow us to explain to them what is a mousetrap.

When in a house, of whatever kind it may be, an individual suspected of any
crime is arrested, the arrest is held secret. Four or five men are placed in
ambuscade in the first room. The door is opened to all who knock. It is closed
after them, and they are arrested; so that at the end of two or three days they
have in their power almost all the habitués of the establishment. And that is a
mousetrap.

The apartment of M. Bonacieux, then, became a mousetrap ; and whoever
appeared there was taken and interrogated by the cardinal’s people. It must be
observed that as a separate passage led to the first floor, in which D’Artagnan
lodged, those who called on him were exempted from this detention.

Besides, nobody came thither but the three Musketeers; they had all been
engaged in earnest search and inquiries, but had discovered nothing. Athos had
even gone so far as to question M. de Treville—a thing which, considering the
habitual reticence of the worthy Musketeer, had very much astonished his
captain. But M. de Tréville knew nothing, except that the last time he had seen
the cardinal, the king, and the queen, the cardinal looked very thoughtful, the
king uneasy, and the redness of the queen’s eyes donated that she had been
sleepless or tearful. But this last circumstance was not striking, as the queen
since her marriage had slept badly and wept much.

M. de Tréville requested Athos, whatever might happen, to be observant of his
duty to the king, but particularly to the queen, begging him to convey his desires
to his comrades.

As to D’Artagnan, he did not budge from his apartment. He converted his

chamber into an observatory. From his windows he saw all the visitors who were
caught. Then, having removed a plank from his floor, and nothing remaining but
a simple ceiling between him and the room beneath, in which the interrogatories
were made, he heard all that passed between the inquisitors and the accused.

The interrogatories, preceded by a minute search operated upon the persons
arrested, were almost always framed thus: “Has Madame Bonacieux sent
anything to you for her husband, or any other person? Has Monsieur Bonacieux
sent any thing to you for his wife, or for any other person? Has either of them
confided anything to you by word of mouth?”

“If they knew anything, they would not question people in this manner,” said
D’Artagnan to himself. “Now, what is it they want to know? Why, they want to
know if the Duke of Buckingham is in Paris, and if he has had, or is likely to
have, an interview with the queen.”

D’Artagnan held onto this idea, which, from what he heard, was not wanting
in probability.

In the meantime, the mousetrap continued in operation, and likewise
D’Artagnan’s vigilance.

On the evening of the day after the arrest of poor Bonacieux, as Athos had just
left D‘Artagnan to report at M. de Tréville’s, as nine o’clock had just struck, and
as Planchet, who had not yet made the bed, was beginning his task, a knocking
was heard at the street door. The door was instantly opened and shut; someone
was taken in the mousetrap.

D’Artagnan flew to his hole, laid himself down on the floor at full length, and
listened.

Cries were soon heard, and then moans, which someone appeared to be
endeavoring to stifle. There were no questions.

“The devil!” said D’Artagnan to himself. “It seems like a woman! They
search her; she resists; they use force—the scoundrels!”

In spite of his prudence, D’Artagnan restrained himself with great difficulty
from taking a part in the scene that was going on below.

“But I tell you that I am the mistress of the house, gentlemen! I tell you I am
Madame Bonacieux; I tell you I belong to the queen!” cried the unfortunate
woman.

“Madame Bonacieuxl” murmured D’Artagnan. “Can I be so lucky as to find
what everybody is seeking for?”

The voice became more and more indistinct; a tumultuous movement shook
the partition. The victim resisted as much as a woman could resist four men.

“Pardon, gentlemen—par—” murmured the voice, which could now be only
heard in inarticulate sounds.

“They are binding her; they are going to drag her away,” cried D’Artagnan to
himself, springing up from the floor. “My sword! good, it is by my side!
Planchet!”

“Monsieur.”

“Run and seek Athos, Porthos, and Aramis. One of the three will certainly be
at home, perhaps all three. Tell them to take arms, to come here, and to run! Ah,
I remember, Athos is at Monsieur de Tréville’s.”

“But where are you going, monsieur, where are you going?”

“I am going down by the window, in order to be there the sooner,” cried
D’Artagnan. “You put back the boards, sweep the floor, go out at the door, and
run as I told you.”

“Oh, monsieur! monsieur! you will kill yourself,” cried Planchet.

“Hold your tongue, stupid fellow,” said D’Artagnan; and laying hold of the
casement, he let himself gently down from the first story, which fortunately was
not very elevated, without doing himself the slightest injury.

He then went straight to the door and knocked, murmuring, “I will go myself
and be caught in the mousetrap, but woe be to the cats that shall pounce upon
such a mouse!”

The knocker had scarcely sounded under the hand of the young man before
the tumult ceased, steps approached, the door was opened, and D’Artagnan,
sword in hand, rushed into the rooms of M. Bonacieux, the door of which,
doubtless acted upon by a spring, closed after him.

Then those who dwelt in Bonacieux’s unfortunate house, together with the
nearest neighbors, heard loud cries, stamping of feet, clashing of swords, and
breaking of furniture. A moment after, those who, surprised by this tumult, had
gone to their windows to learn the cause of it, saw the door open, and four men,
clothed in black, not come out of it, but fly, like so many frightened crows,
leaving on the ground and on the corners of the furniture, feathers from their
wings; that is to say, patches of their clothes and fragments of their cloaks.

D‘Artagnan was conqueror—without much effort, it must be confessed, for
only one of the officers was armed, and even he defended himself for form’s
sake. It is true that the three others had endeavored to knock the young man
down with chairs, stools, and crockery; but two or three scratches made by the
Gascon’s blade terrified them. Ten minutes sufficed for their defeat, and
D’Artagnan remained master of the field of battle.

The neighbors who had opened their windows, with the coolness peculiar to
the inhabitants of Paris in these times of perpetual riots and disturbances, closed
them again as soon as they saw the four men in black flee—their instinct telling
them that for the time all was over. Besides, it began to grow late, and then, as
today, people went to bed early in the quarter of the Luxembourg.

On being left alone with Mme. Bonacieux, D‘Artagnan turned toward her; the
poor woman reclined where she had been left, half-fainting upon an armchair.
D’Artagnan examined her with a rapid glance.

She was a charming woman of twenty-five or twenty-six years, with dark hair,
blue eyes, and a nose slightly turned up, admirable teeth, and a complexion
marbled with rose and opal. There, however, ended the signs which might have
confounded her with a lady of rank. The hands were white, but without delicacy;
the feet did not bespeak the woman of quality. Happily, D’Artagnan was not yet
acquainted with such niceties.

While D’Artagnan was examining Mme. Bonacieux, and was, as we have
said, close to her, he saw on the ground a fine cambric handkerchief, which he
picked up, as was his habit, and at the corner of which he recognized the same
cipher he had seen on the handkerchief which had nearly caused him and Aramis
to cut each other’s throat.

From that time, D’Artagnan had been cautious with respect to handkerchiefs
with arms on them, and he therefore placed in the pocket of Mme. Bonacieux the
one he had just picked up.

At that moment Mme. Bonacieux recovered her senses. She opened her eyes,
looked around her with terror, saw that the apartment was empty and that she
was alone with her liberator. She extended her hands to him with a smile. Mme.
Bonacieux had the sweetest smile in the world.

“Ah, monsieur! said she, ”you have saved me; permit me to thank you.”

“Madame,” said D’Artagnan, “I have only done what every gentleman would
have done in my place; you owe me no thanks.”

“Oh, yes, monsieur, oh, yes; and I hope to prove to you that you have not
served an ingrate. But what could these men, whom I at first took for robbers,
want with me, and why is Monsieur Bonacieux not here?”

Madame, those men were much more dangerous than any robbers could have
been, for they are the agents of the cardinal; and as to your husband, Monsieur
Bonacieux, he is not here because he was yesterday evening conducted to the
Bastille.”

“My husband in the Bastille!” cried Mme. Bonacieux. “Oh, my God! what has

he done? Poor dear man, he is innocence itself!”
And something like a faint smile lighted the still-terrified features of the

young woman.
“What has he done, madame?” said D’Artagnan. “I believe that his only crime

is to have at the same time the good fortune and the misfortune to be your
husband.”

“But, monsieur, you know then—”
“I know that you have been abducted, madame.”
“And by whom? Do you know him? Oh, if you know him, tell me!”
“By a man of from forty to forty-five years, with black hair, a dark
complexion, and a scar on his left temple.”
“That is he, that is he; but his name?”
“Ah, his name? I do not know that.”
“And did my husband know I had been carried off?”
“He was informed of it by a letter, written to him by the abductor himself.”
“And does he suspect,” said Mme. Bonacieux, with some embarrassment, “the
cause of this event?”
“He attributed it, I believe, to a political cause.”
“I doubted from the first; and now I think entirely as he does. Then my dear
Monsieur Bonacieux has not suspected me a single instant?”
“So far from it, madame, he was too proud of your prudence, and above all, of
your love.”
A second smile, almost imperceptible, stole over the rosy lips of the pretty
young woman.
“But,” continued D’Artagnan, “how did you escape?”
“I took advantage of a moment when they left me alone; and as I had known
since morning the reason of my abduction, with the help of the sheets I let
myself down from the window. Then, as I believed my husband would be at
home, I hastened hither.”
“To place yourself under his protection?”
“Oh, no, poor dear man! I knew very well that he was incapable of defending
me; but as he could serve us in other ways, I wished to inform him.”
“Of what?”
“Oh, that is not my secret; I must not, therefore, tell you.”
“Besides,” said D’Artagnan, “pardon me, madame, if, guardsman as I am, I

remind you of prudence—besides, I believe we are not here in a very proper
place for imparting confidences. The men I have put to flight will return
reinforced; if they find us here, we are lost. I have sent for three of my friends,
but who knows whether they were at home?”

“Yes, yes! you are right,” cried the affrighted Mme. Bonacieux; “let us fly! let
us save ourselves.”

At these words she passed her arm under that of D’Artagnan, and urged him
forward eagerly.

“But whither shall we fly—whither escape?”

“Let us first withdraw from this house; afterward we shall see.”

The young woman and the young man, without taking the trouble to shut the
door after them, descended the Rue des Fossoyeurs rapidly, turned into the Rue
des Fossés-Monsieur-le-Prince, and did not stop till they came to the Place St.
Sulpice.

“And now what are we to do, and where do you wish me to conduct you?”
asked D’Artagnan.

“I am quite at a loss how to answer you, I admit,” said Mme. Bonacieux. “My
intention was to inform Monsieur Laporte, through my husband, in order that
Monsieur Laporte might tell us precisely what has taken place at the Louvre in
the last three days, and whether there is any danger in presenting myself there.”

“But I,” said D’Artagnan, “can go and inform Monsieur Laporte.”

“No doubt you could, only there is one misfortune, and that is that Monsieur
Bonacieux is known at the Louvre, and would be allowed to pass; whereas you
are not known there, and the gate would be closed against you.”

“Ah, bah!” said D’Artagnan; “you have at some wicket of the Louvre a
concierge who is devoted to you, and who, thanks to a password, would—”

Mme. Bonacieux looked earnestly at the young man.

“And if I give you this password,” said she, “would you forget it as soon as
you had used it?”

“By my honor, by the faith of a gentleman!” said D’Artagnan, with an accent
so truthful that no one could mistake it.

“Then I believe you. You appear to be a brave young man; besides, your
fortune may perhaps be the result of your devotedness.”

“I will do, without a promise and voluntarily, all that I can do to serve the king
and be agreeable to the queen. Dispose of me, then, as a friend.”

“But I—where shall I go meanwhile?”

“Is there nobody from whose house Monsieur Laporte can come and fetch
you?”

“No, I can trust nobody.”
“Stop,” said D’Artagnan; “we are near Athos’s door. Yes, here it is.”
“Who is this Athos?”
“One of my friends.”
“But if he should be at home, and see me?”
“He is not at home, and I will carry away the key, after having placed you in
his apartment.”
“But if he should return?”
“Oh, he won’t return; and if he should, he will be told that I have brought a
woman with me, and that woman is in his apartment.”
“But that will compromise me sadly, you know.”
“Of what consequence? Nobody knows you. Besides, we are in a situation to
overlook ceremony.”
“Come, then, let us go to your friend’s house. Where does he live?”
“Rue Férou, two steps from here.”
“Let us go!”
Both resumed their way. As D’Artagnan had foreseen, Athos was not within.
He took the key, which was customarily given him as one of the family,
ascended the stairs, and introduced Mme. Bonacieux into the little apartment of
which we have given a description.
“You are at home,” said he. “Remain here, fasten the door inside, and open it
to nobody unless you hear three taps, like this;” and he tapped thrice—two taps
close together and pretty hard, the other after an interval, and lighter.
“That is well,” said Mme. Bonacieux. “Now, in my turn, let me give you my
instructions.”
“I am all attention.”
“Present yourself at the wicket of the Louvre, on the side of the Rue de
l’Echelle, and ask for Germain.”
“Well, and then?”
“He will ask you what you want, and you will answer by these two words,
‘Tours’ and ‘Bruxelles.’ He will at once put himself at your orders.”
“And what shall I command him?”
“To go and fetch Monsieur Laporte, the queen’s valet de chambre.”

“And when he shall have informed him, and Monsieur Laporte is come?”

“You will send him to me.”

“That is well; but where and how shall I see you again?”

“Do you much wish to see me again?”

“Certainly.”

“Well, let that care be mine, and be at ease.”

“I depend upon your word.”

“You may.”

D‘Artagnan bowed to Mme. Bonacieux, darting at her the most loving glance
that he could possibly concentrate upon her charming little person; and while he
descended the stairs, he heard the door closed and double-locked. In two bounds
he was at the Louvre; as he entered the wicket of L’Echelle, ten o’clock struck.
All the events we have described had taken place within a half hour.

Everything fell out as Mme. Bonacieux prophesied. On hearing the password,
Germain bowed. In a few minutes Laporte was at the lodge; in two words
D’Artagnan informed him where Mme. Bonacieux was. Laporte assured himself,
by having it twice repeated, of the accurate address, and set off at a run. Hardly,
however, had he taken ten steps before he returned.

“Young man,” said he to D’Artagnan, “a suggestion.”

“What?”

“You may get into trouble by what has taken place.”

“You believe so?”

“Yes. Have you any friend whose clock is too slow?”

“Well?”

“Go and call upon him, in order that he may give evidence of your having
been with him at half past nine. In a court of justice that is called an alibi.”

D‘Artagnan found his advice prudent. He took to his heels, and was soon at
M. de Tréville’s; but instead of going into the saloon with the rest of the crowd,
he asked to be introduced to M. de Tréville’s office. As D’Artagnan so
constantly frequented the hotel, no difficulty was made in complying with his
request, and a servant went to inform M. de Tréville that his young compatriot,
having something important to communicate, solicited a private audience. Five
minutes after, M. de Tréville was asking D’Artagnan what he could do to serve
him, and what caused his visit at so late an hour.

“Pardon me, monsieur,” said D’Artagnan, who had profited by the moment he
had been left alone to put back M. de Tréville’s clock three-quarters of an hour,

“but I thought, as it was yet only twenty-five minutes past nine, it was not too
late to wait upon you.”

“Twenty-five minutes past nine!” cried M. de Tréville, looking at the clock;
“why, that’s impossible!”

“Look, rather, monsieur,” said D’Artagnan, “the clock shows it.”

“That’s true,” said M. de Tréville; “I believed it later. But what can I do for
you?”

Then D’Artagnan told M. de Tréville a long history about the queen. He
expressed to him the fears he entertained with respect to her Majesty; he related
to him what he had heard of the projects of the cardinal with regard to
Buckingham, and all with a tranquillity and candor of which M. de Tréville was
the more the dupe, from having himself, as we have said, observed something
fresh between the cardinal, the king, and the queen.

As ten o‘clock was striking, D’Artagnan left M. de Tréville, who thanked him
for his information, recommended him to have the service of the king and queen
always at heart, and returned to the saloon; but at the foot of the stairs,
D’Artagnan remembered he had forgotten his cane. He consequently sprang up
again, re-entered the office, with a turn of his finger set the clock right again,
that it might not be perceived the next day that it had been put wrong, and
certain from that time that he had a witness to prove his alibi, he ran downstairs
and soon found himself in the street.

II

IN WHICH THE PLOT THICKENS

His visit to M. de Tréville being paid, the pensive D‘Artagnan took the
longest way homeward. On what was D’Artagnan thinking, that he strayed thus
from his path, gazing at the stars of heaven, and sometimes sighing, sometimes
smiling?

He was thinking of Mme. Bonacieux. For an apprentice Musketeer the young
woman was almost an ideal of love. Pretty, mysterious, initiated in almost all the
secrets of the court, which reflected such a charming gravity over her pleasing
features, it might be surmised that she was not wholly unmoved; and this is an
irresistible charm to novices in love. Moreover, D’Artagnan had delivered her
from the hands of the demons who wished to search and ill treat her; and this
important service had established between them one of those sentiments of
gratitude which so easily assume a more tender character.

D’Artagnan already fancied himself, so rapid is the flight of our dreams upon
the wings of imagination, accosted by a messenger from the young woman, who
brought him some billet appointing a meeting, a gold chain, or a diamond. We
have observed that young cavaliers received presents from their king without
shame. Let us add that in these times of lax morality they had no more delicacy
with respect to their mistresses; and that the latter almost always left them
valuable and durable remembrances, as if they essayed to conquer the fragility of
their sentiments by the solidity of their gifts.

Without a blush, men then made their way in the world by the means of
women blushing. Such as were only beautiful gave their beauty, whence, without
doubt, comes the proverb, “The most beautiful girl in the world can only give
what she has.” Such as were rich gave in addition a part of their money; and a
vast number of heroes of that gallant period may be cited who would neither
have won their spurs in the first place, nor their battles afterward, without the
purse, more or less furnished, which their mistress fastened to the saddle bow.

D‘Artagnan owned nothing. Provincial diffidence, that slight varnish, the
ephemeral flower, that down of the peach, had evaporated to the winds through
the little orthodox counsels which the three Musketeers gave their friend.

D’Artagnan, following the strange custom of the times, considered himself at
Paris as on a campaign, neither more nor less than if he had been in Flanders—
Spain yonder, woman here. In each there was an enemy to contend with, and
contributions to be levied.

But, we must say, at the present moment D’Artagnan was ruled by a feeling
much more noble and disinterested. The mercer had said that he was rich; the
young man might easily guess that with so weak a man as M. Bonacieux it must
be the wife who kept the purse key. But all this had no influence upon the
feeling produced by the sight of Mme. Bonacieux; and interest was almost
foreign to this commencement of love, which had been the consequence of it.
We say almost, for the idea that a young, handsome, kind, and witty woman is at
the same time rich, takes nothing from the beginning of love, but on the contrary
strengthens it.

There are in affluence a crowd of aristocratic cares and caprices which are
highly becoming to beauty. A fine and white stocking, a silken robe, a lace
kerchief, a pretty slipper on the foot, a tasty ribbon on the head, do not make an
ugly woman pretty, but they make a pretty woman beautiful, without reckoning
the hands, which gain by all this; the hands, among women particularly, to be
beautiful must be idle.

Then D‘Artagnan, as the reader, from whom we have not concealed the state
of his fortune, very well knows—D’Artagnan was not a millionaire; he hoped to
become one someday, but the time which in his own mind he fixed upon for this
happy change was still far distant. In the meanwhile, how disheartening to see
the woman one loves long for those thousands of nothings which constitute a
woman’s happiness, and be unable to give her those thousands of nothings. At
least, when the woman is rich and the lover is not, that which he cannot offer she
offers to herself; and although it is generally with her husband’s money that she
procures herself this indulgence, the gratitude for it seldom reverts to him.

Then D‘Artagnan, disposed to become the most tender of lovers, was at the
same time a very devoted friend. In the midst of his amorous projects for the
mercer’s wife, he did not forget his friends. The pretty Mme. Bonacieux was just
the woman to walk with in the Plaine St. Denis or in the fair of St. Germain, in
company with Athos, Porthos, and Aramis, to whom D’Artagnan would be so
proud to display such a conquest. Then, when people walk for any length of time
they become hungry; D‘Artagnan had often remarked this. Then one could enjoy
charming little dinners, where one touches on one side the hand of a friend, and
on the other the foot of a mistress. Besides, on pressing occasions, in extreme
difficulties, D’Artagnan would become the preserver of his friends.

And M. Bonacieux? whom D‘Artagnan had pushed into the hands of the
officers, denying him aloud although he had promised in a whisper to save him.
We are compelled to admit to our readers that D’Artagnan thought nothing about
him in anyway; or that if he did think of him, it was only to say to himself that
he was very well where he was, wherever it might be. Love is the most selfish of
all the passions.

Let our readers reassure themselves. If D’Artagnan forgets his host, or appears
to forget him, under the pretense of not knowing where he has been carried, we
will not forget him, and we know where he is. But for the moment, let us do as
did the amorous Gascon; we will see after the worthy mercer later.

D‘Artagnan, reflecting on his future amours, addressing himself to the
beautiful night, and smiling at the stars, reascended the Rue Cherche-Midi, or
Chasse-Midi, as it was then called. As he found himself in the quarter in which
Aramis lived, he took it into his head to pay his friend a visit in order to explain
the motives which had led him to send Planchet with a request that he would
come instantly to the mousetrap. Now, if Aramis had been at home when
Planchet came to his abode, he had doubtless hastened to the Rue des
Fossoyeurs, and finding nobody there but his other two companions perhaps,
they would not be able to conceive what all this meant. This mystery required an
explanation; at least, so D’Artagnan declared to himself.

He likewise thought this was an opportunity for talking about pretty little
Mme. Bonacieux, of whom his head, if not his heart, was already full. We must
never look for discretion in first love. First love is accompanied by such
excessive joy that unless the joy be allowed to overflow, it will stifle you.

Paris for two hours past had been dark, and seemed a desert. Eleven o‘clock
sounded from all the clocks of the Faubourg St. Germain. It was delightful
weather. D’Artagnan was passing along a lane on the spot where the Rue
d‘Assas is now situated, breathing the balmy emanations which were borne upon
the wind from the Rue de Vaugirard, and which arose from the gardens refreshed
by the dews of evening and the breeze of night. From a distance resounded,
deadened, however, by good shutters, the songs of the tipplers, enjoying
themselves in the cabarets scattered along the plain. Arrived at the end of the
lane, D’Artagnan turned to the left. The house in which Aramis dwelt was
situated between the Rue Cassette and the Rue Servandoni.

D‘Artagnan had just passed the Rue Cassette, and already perceived the door
of his friend’s house, shaded by a mass of sycamores and clematis which formed
a vast arch opposite the front of it, when he perceived something like a shadow
issuing from the Rue Servandoni. This something was enveloped in a cloak, and

D’Artagnan at first believed it was a man; but by the smallness of the form, the
hesitation of the walk, and the indecision of the step, he soon discovered that it
was a woman. Further, this woman, as if not certain of the house she was
seeking, lifted up her eyes to look around her, stopped, went backward, and then
returned again. D’Artagnan was perplexed.

“Shall I go and offer her my services?” thought he. “By her step she must be
young; perhaps she is pretty. Oh, yes! But a woman who wanders in the streets
at this hour only ventures out to meet her lover. If I should disturb a rendezvous,
that would not be the best means of commencing an acquaintance.”

Meantime the young woman continued to advance, counting the houses and
windows. This was neither long nor difficult. There were but three hotels in this
part of the street; and only two windows looking toward the road, one of which
was in a pavilion parallel to that which Aramis occupied, the other belonging to
Aramis himself.

“Pardieu!” said D’Artagnan to himself, to whose mind the niece of the
theologian reverted, ”pardieu, it would be droll if this belated dove should be in
search of our friend’s house. But on my soul, it looks so. Ah, my dear Aramis,
this time I shall find you out.” And D’Artagnan, making himself as small as he
could, concealed himself in the darkest side of the street near a stone bench
placed at the back of a niche.

The young woman continued to advance; and in addition to the lightness of
her step, which had betrayed her, she emitted a little cough which denoted a
sweet voice. D’Artagnan believed this cough to be a signal.

Nevertheless, whether this cough had been answered by a similar signal which
had fixed the irresolution of the nocturnal seeker, or whether without this aid she
saw that she had arrived at the end of her journey, she resolutely drew near to
Aramis’s shutter, and tapped, at three equal intervals, with her bent finger.

“This is all very fine, dear Aramis,” murmured D’Artagnan. “Ah, Monsieur
Hypocrite, I understand how you study theology.

The three blows were scarcely struck, when the inside blind was opened and a
light appeared through the panes of the outside shutter.

“Ah, ah!” said the listener, “not through doors, but through windows! Ah, this
visit was expected. We shall see the windows open, and the lady enter by
escalade. Very pretty!”

But to the great astonishment of D’Artagnan, the shutter remained closed. Still
more, the light which had shone for an instant disappeared, and all was again in
obscurity.

D’Artagnan thought this could not last long, and continued to look with all his
eyes and listen with all his ears.

He was right; at the end of some seconds two sharp taps were heard inside.
The young woman in the street replied by a single tap, and the shutter was
opened a little way.

It may be judged whether D’Artagnan looked or listened with avidity.
Unfortunately the light had been removed into another chamber; but the eyes of
the young man were accustomed to the night. Besides, the eyes of Gascons have,
as it is asserted, like those of cats, the faculty of seeing in the dark.

D’Artagnan then saw that the young woman took from her pocket a white
object, which she unfolded quickly, and which took the form of a handkerchief.
She made her interlocutor observe the corner of this unfolded object.

This immediately recalled to D’Artagnan’s mind the handkerchief which he
had found at the feet of Mme. Bonacieux, which had reminded him of that which
he had dragged from under the feet of Aramis.

“What the devil could that handkerchief signify?”

Placed where he was, D’Artagnan could not perceive the face of Aramis. We
say Aramis, because the young man entertained no doubt that it was his friend
who held this dialogue from the interior with the lady of the exterior. Curiosity
prevailed over prudence; and profiting by the preoccupation into which the sight
of the handkerchief appeared to have plunged the two personages now on the
scene, he stole from his hiding place, and quick as lightning, but stepping with
utmost caution, he ran and placed himself close to the angle of the wall, from
which his eye could pierce the interior of Aramis’s room.

Upon gaining this advantage D‘Artagnan was near uttering a cry of surprise; it
was not Aramis who was conversing with the nocturnal visitor, it was a woman!
D’Artagnan, however, could only see enough to recognize the form of her
vestments, not enough to distinguish her features.

At the same instant the woman inside drew a second handkerchief from her
pocket, and exchanged it for that which had just been shown to her. Then some
words were spoken by the two women. At length the shutter closed. The woman
who was outside the window turned round, and passed within four steps of
D‘Artagnan, pulling down the hood of her mantle; but the precaution was too
late, D’Artagnan had already recognized Mme. Bonacieux.

Mme. Bonacieux! The suspicion that it was she had crossed the mind of
D’Artagnan when she drew the handkerchief from her pocket; but what
probability was there that Mme. Bonacieux, who had sent for M. Laporte in

order to be reconducted to the Louvre, should be running about the streets of
Paris at half past eleven at night, at the risk of being abducted a second time?

This must be, then, an affair of importance; and what is the most important
affair to a woman of twenty-five! Love.

But was it on her own account, or on account of another, that she exposed
herself to such hazards? This was a question the young man asked himself,
whom the demon of jealousy already gnawed, being in heart neither more nor
less than an accepted lover.

There was a very simple means of satisfying himself whither Mme. Bonacieux
was going; that was to follow her. This method was so simple that D’Artagnan
employed it quite naturally and instinctively.

But at the sight of the young man, who detached himself from the wall like a
statue walking from its niche, and at the noise of the steps which she heard
resound behind her, Mme. Bonacieux uttered a little cry and fled.

D‘Artagnan ran after her. It was not difficult for him to overtake a woman
embarrassed with her cloak. He came up with her before she had traversed a
third of the street. The unfortunate woman was exhausted, not by fatigue, but by
terror, and when D’Artagnan placed his hand upon her shoulder, she sank upon
one knee, crying in a choking voice, “Kill me, if you please, you shall know
nothing!”

D‘Artagnan raised her by passing his arm round her waist; but as he felt by
her weight she was on the point of fainting, he made haste to reassure her by
protestations of devotedness. These protestations were nothing for Mme.
Bonacieux, for such protestations may be made with the worst intentions in the
world; but the voice was all. Mme. Bonacieux thought she recognized the sound
of that voice; she reopened her eyes, cast a quick glance upon the man who had
terrified her so, and at once perceiving it was D’Artagnan, she uttered a cry of
joy, “Oh, it is you, it is you! Thank God, thank God!”

“Yes, it is I,” said D’Artagnan, “it is I, whom God has sent to watch over
you.”

“Was it with that intention you followed me?” asked the young woman, with a
coquettish smile, whose somewhat bantering character resumed its influence,
and with whom all fear had disappeared from the moment in which she
recognized a friend in one she had taken for an enemy.

“No,” said D’Artagnan; “no, I confess it. It was chance that threw me in your
way; I saw a woman knocking at the window of one of my friends.”

“Of one of your friends?” interrupted Mme. Bonacieux.

“Without doubt; Aramis is one of my best friends.”
“Aramis! Who is he?”
“Come, come, you won’t tell me you don’t know Aramis?”
“This is the first time I ever heard his name pronounced.”
“It is the first time, then, that you ever went to that house?”
“Undoubtedly.”
“And you did not know that it was inhabited by a young man?”
“No.”
“By a Musketeer?”
“No, indeed!”
“It was not he, then, you came to seek?”
“Not the least in the world. Besides, you must have seen that the person to
whom I spoke was a woman.”
“That is true; but this woman is a friend of Aramis—”
“I know nothing of that.”
“—since she lodges with him.”
“That does not concern me.”
“But who is she?”
“Oh, that is not my secret.”
“My dear Madame Bonacieux, you are charming; but at the same time you are
one of the most mysterious women.”
“Do I lose by that?”
“No; you are, on the contrary, adorable.”
“Give me your arm, then.”
“Most willingly. And now?”
“Now escort me.”
“Where?”
“Where I am going.”
“But where are you going?”
“You will see, because you will leave me at the door.”
“Shall I wait for you?”
“That will be useless.”
“You will return alone, then?”

“Perhaps yes, perhaps no.”
“But will the person who shall accompany you afterward be a man or a
woman?”
“I don’t know yet.”
“But I will know it!”
“How so?”
“I will wait till you come out.”
“In that case, adieu.”
“Why so?”
“I do not want you.”
“But you have claimed—”
“The aid of a gentleman, not the watchfulness of a spy.”
“The word is rather hard.”
“How are they called who follow others in spite of them?”
“They are indiscreet.”
“The word is too mild.”
“Well, madame, I perceive I must do as you wish.”
“Why did you deprive yourself of the merit of doing so at once?”
“Is there no merit in repentance?”
“And you do really repent?”
“I know nothing about it myself. But what I know is that I promise to do all
you wish if you will allow me to accompany you where you are going.”
“And you will leave me then?”
“Yes.”
“Without waiting for my coming out again?”
“Yes.”
“Word of honor?”
“By the faith of a gentleman. Take my arm, and let us go.” D’Artagnan
offered his arm to Mme. Bonacieux, who willingly took it, half laughing, half
trembling, and both gained the top of Rue de la Harpe. Arriving there, the young
woman seemed to hesitate, as she had before done in the Rue Vaugirard. She
seemed, however, by certain signs, to recognize a door, and approaching that
door, “And now, monsieur,” said she, “it is here I have business; a thousand
thanks for your honorable company, which has saved me from all the dangers to